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When Carlos Gomez signed his extension in mid-March, Doug Melvin spoke about the importance of locking up his young “up-the-middle” starters. Gomez joined Jonathan Lucroy in being signed through 2016. Now, it looks like the Brewers may be looking to keep another young star in town — Fox Sports’ Ken Rosenthal says the team offered Jean Segura a contract extension about a month ago.

Of course, this was before Segura started his season by hitting .368/.412/.588 in his first 35 games, racking up 50 hits already with 6 home runs and a league-leading 13 stolen bases in 15 attempts. His asking price has probably gone up since then.

It’s always hard to guess what an extension for a guy with less than one year of service time would look like, but it’s not something the Brewers are completely new to, either. The first time they locked up Ryan Braun, he had less than a full year in the majors. That deal (the one he’s still on, as the $100-million extension doesn’t begin until 2016) ended up being for 8 years and $45 million. Braun was coming off of a Rookie of the Year season, however, and had 152 career games under his belt. To date, Segura has only played in 80 big league games.

With that in mind, it’s easy to see why Segura’s agent says nothing is imminent. The Brewers would obviously like to get good value by locking him into a deal before he becomes an All-Star (if current results or those just below it hold). Segura and his agent would want to hold off on signing anything too far below market value for the same reason. At the same time, the Brewers don’t want to be making any potentially expensive mistakes based on a tiny sample of less than 150 plate appearances.

The good news is Segura seems to be open to the idea of staying in Milwaukee, based on a recent article in the Journal-Sentinel, and an early extension would provide some early financial security while leaving the door open to a bigger payday down the road — much like the initial Braun extension.

The Segura extension talk comes a day after the Cubs finalized a seven-year, $41 million deal with first baseman Anthony Rizzo with options and escalators that could push the deal over $70 million. Segura is in his age-23 season, making $492,000 this season.